Six humans traped by happenstance
in bleak and bitter cold.
Each one possessed a stick of wood
or so the story's told.

Their dying fire in need of logs,
the first man held his back.
For the faces around the fire
he noticed one was black.

The man looking across the way
saw one not of his church,
And couldn't bring himself to give
the fire his stick of birch.

The third one sat in tattered cloths
he gave his coat a hitch;
Why should his log be put to use
to warm the idle rich.

The rich man sat back and thought
of the welth he had in store,
And how to keep what he had earned
from the lazy shiftless poor.

The black man's facebespoke of revenge
as the fire passed from sight.
For all he could see in his stick of wood
was a chance to spite the white.

The last man of this forlorn group
did nought except for gain.
Giving only to those who gave
was how he played the game.

Their logs held tight in death's still hands
was proof of human sin.
They didn't die from the cold without...
they died from the cold within.

...unknown